Insight Guides - Explore Boston: The best routes around the city

How To Use This E-Book

This Explore Guide has been produced by the editors of Insight Guides, whose books have set the standard for visual travel guides since 1970. With top-quality photography and authoritative recommendations, these guidebooks bring you the very best routes and itineraries in the worlds most exciting destinations.

Best Routes

The routes in this book provide something to suit all budgets, tastes and trip lengths. As well as covering the destinations many classic attractions, the itineraries track lesser-known sights, and there are also excursions for those who want to extend their visit outside the city. The routes embrace a range of interests, so whether you are an art fan, a gourmet, a history buff or have kids to entertain, you will find an option to suit.

We recommend reading the whole of a route before setting out. This should help you to familiarise yourself with it and enable you to plan where to stop for refreshments options are shown in the Food and Drink box at the end of each tour.

Introduction

The routes are set in context by this introductory section, giving an overview of the destination to set the scene, plus background information on food and drink, shopping and more, while a succinct history timeline highlights the key events over the centuries.

Directory

Also supporting the routes is a Directory chapter, with a clearly organised AZ of practical information, our pick of where to stay while you are there and select restaurant listings; these eateries complement the more low-key cafs and restaurants that feature within the routes and are intended to offer a wider choice for evening dining. Also included here are some nightlife listings, and our recommendations for books and films about the destination.

Getting around the e-book

In the Table of Contents and throughout this e-book you will see hyperlinked references. Just tap a hyperlink once to skip to the section you would like to read. Practical information and listings are also hyperlinked, so as long as you have an external connection to the internet, you can tap a link to go directly to the website for more information.

Maps

All key attractions and sights mentioned in the text are numbered and cross-referenced to high-quality maps. Wherever you see the reference [map] just tap this to go straight to the related map. You can also double-tap any map for a zoom view.

Images

Youll find hundreds of beautiful high-resolution images that capture the essence of the destination. Simply double-tap on an image to see it full-screen.

2014 Apa Publications (UK) Ltd

Table of Contents

Recommended Routes For...

Architecture

Beacon Hill () is a fantastic 21st-century addition.

Richard Nowitz/Apa Publications

Art enthusiasts

If you love art, dont miss the Museum of Fine Arts and Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum ().

Abraham Nowitz/Apa Publications

Children

The Aquarium and the Childrens Museum () either.

Richard Nowitz/Apa Publications

Food and wine

Dine out in either the North End ().

Richard Nowitz/Apa Publications

Parks and gardens

Bostons Emerald Necklace of parks and gardens extends from the Common ().

Richard Nowitz/Apa Publications

Revolutionary Boston

Follow the Freedom Trail of revolutionary sites through Downtown ().

Richard Nowitz/Apa Publications

Science and technology

The Museum of Science and the MIT Museum and campus ().

Richard Nowitz/Apa Publications

Waterside views

You are seldom far from water in Boston, be it the Charles River ().

Abraham Nowitz/Apa Publications

On the steps of the Widener Library, Harvard

Abraham Nowitz/Apa Publications

Explore Boston

Boston is considered the most European of American cities hardly surprising given its British colonial roots. But this is also the birthplace of the countrys independence, and home to some of its most illustrious Ivy League institutions.

Boston is small (population 636,479 as of the 2012 census) and compact (48.5 sq. miles/125 sq. km), making it an ideal city for discovering on foot. It may only be the 22nd-largest city in the US in size, but in historical legacy Boston is huge. Among the lofty phrases coined to describe the city are the Cradle of Liberty, the Athens of America, and the Hub of the Universe (a variant of the latter was first used by one of Bostons greatest literary sons Oliver Wendell Holmes to describe the State House).

A rich heritage

Many visitors come here to walk in the footsteps of the Founding Fathers and soak up the Old World atmosphere that nurtured some of Americas most gifted artistic, mercantile, and political talents, including the poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (180782), the artist John Singer Sargent (18561925), and President John F. Kennedy (191763). Boston plays up this rich heritage in projects such as the Freedom Trail, the Black Heritage Trail, and the Battle Road Trail between Lexington and Concord. That many historical monuments and sites have been preserved as part of the fabric of the city is a large part of Bostons appeal. The US National Parks Service records 186 National Historic Landmarks in the state of Massachusetts; only New York State beats it with 261. A good proportion of these sites are found in the Boston city area and surrounding towns such as Concord, Lexington, Plymouth, Provincetown, and Salem.